The mission of The Voice of the Patient is simple: To change lives, that is, to improve the quality of the lives we touch by improving healthcare through not only hearing, but truly listening to the voice of the patient.
My name is Dave Reed and I am a physical therapist with over 10 years of clinical and administrative service in outpatient, acute care, home health, and regulatory settings. I’ve been absolutely blessed to have had such breadth and depth of experiences and mentorship during this period. The most important lesson I’ve learned, though, is that excellent care is at least as much about the service as it is about the science. Probably more so.
In 2009, with healthcare changing rapidly and “productivity” metastasizing its effect on clinical practice, a leadership position became available in the hospital system I was with at the time. Knowing excellent service did not have to be compromised at the expense of business health, instead, it should be expected to serve as the basis for growth, I accepted the position. My career and life would never be the same.
After earning my MBA from Michigan State University, my family and I moved to North Carolina in 2012 to accept a position directing rehabilitation services at a small hospital in the rural western part of the state. Among many opportunities that this position afforded, I was invited to attend training from Mayo Clinic staff in healthcare communication, pioneers in large-scale communications and performance improvement implementation. Afterward, my team was tasked with training and implementing the same systems in our hospital.
Today, most of my practice is administrative (though I do sneak back into the clinic whenever I can). I have the privilege to work with geriatric clients in the assisted living setting in throughout the state of North Carolina. In that capacity, I get to work with patients, their families, and other providers in the most functional of environments. Finally, I get to work on a project that’s been the focus of much of my career until now: healthcare with service as the driver and the patient as the heart. Please join me.